It's been a discouraging year for many Americans. But cheer up, chin up; a new year full of new chances is on the way.

Have yourself a merry little Christmas,Make the Yule-tide gay,From now on, our troubles will be miles away....

Sing it, Judy!

And a big MERRY CHRISTMAS as well to our returning troops:

Christmas Eve will find them

Where the love-light gleams

They'll be home for Christmas

And not just in their dreams......

Merry Christmas and warm wishes to all Deafening Silence readers, religious or not. I hope everyone will have an opportunity to hug a loved one, raise a glass to treasured friends or simply take a deep breath and get ready for the New Year ahead.

My sweetheart stumbled across this YouTube video last nite and we both found it stunning. Notice how the dancers take turns being the lead. A YouTube commenter referred to this as being "ambidancetrous," which I think is charming. Note that (like Jaye Davidson's portrayal of Dil in The Crying Game), this isn't some attention-getting schtick; it's just great dancing.

In whatever kind of a ‘race’ life may be, I have very abruptly become a finalist.

Christopher Hitchens

Christopher Hitchens, writer and perennial target for both ardor and ire, has died at age 62. He had already discontinued further cancer treatment and was in hospice when he was felled by pnuemonia, a complication of esophageal cancer.

Spare a kind thought (not a prayer, God knows he would hate that) today for his wife and children. Agree or disagree with him, he was loved and will be missed by them.

Here's a quick roundup of reactions to his passing:

This piece at CBS News is a very good summation of his life and work, for the less-initiated:

He was a militant humanist who believed in pluralism and racial justice and freedom of speech, big cities and fine art and the willingness to stand the consequences. He was smacked in the rear by then-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and beaten up in Beirut. He once submitted to waterboarding to prove that it was indeed torture.

Armed with a quick wit and a keen appetite for combat, Mr. Hitchens was in constant demand as a speaker on television, radio and the debating platform, where he held forth in a sonorous, plummily accented voice that seemed at odds with his disheveled appearance. He was a master of the extended peroration, peppered with literary allusions, and of the bright, off-the-cuff remark.

"I mean I thought of, at one point, entitling the book Both Sides Now, to describe the various ambivalences and contradictions that I've been faced with, or that I contained: English and American, Anglo-Celtic and Jewish, Marxist and — what shall we say — I've been accused of being this, accused of being a neoconservative and not always thought of it as an insult; internationalist but in a way patriotic," he said.

“My chief consolation in this year of living dyingly has been the presence of friends,” he wrote in the June 2011 issue. He died in their presence, too, at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. May his 62 years of living, well, so livingly console the many of us who will miss him dearly.

At a rare public appearance in his final months, Hitchens conceded that his time was running short, but said that he had no plans to give up his life's work in the face of his deteriorating health. "I'm not going to quit until I absolutely have to," he said then, drawing an ovation from the crowd.

Hitchens lived up to that promise, authoring articles for a number of publications during his final weeks on everything from American politics to his own mortality. Writing for Vanity Fair in a piece that was published only days before he died, Hitchens reaffirmed that he hoped to be fully conscious and awake as he passed away, "in order to 'do' death in the active and not the passive sense," much as he had previously explained to his readers was his wish even before he learned of his cancer and prognosis.

"I do, still, try to nurture that little flame of curiosity and defiance: willing to play out the string to the end and wishing to be spared nothing that properly belongs to a life span," he wrote.

Hitch, an idealist committed to protecting human rights and to putting thugs in their place, embraced a muscular internationalism consistent with the stand he'd taken on the Falklands war (in 1982, Christopher, a then-uncompromising socialist, was at one with Mrs. Thatcher) and that he would take on the two wars against Saddam Hussein.

Another Christmastime commercial that drives me nuts is the one(s) for Kay Jewellers. The husband/boyfriend buys the missus/girlfriend a diamond whatever and she gives him some sugar. The tagline as they smooch is “Every Kiss Begins with Kay.” Now, I understand that it’s also a pun (“kiss” begins with “K”, har har har), but if every kiss begins with a bauble from the jewelers then, well, your wife’s a whore.

I agree completely and this commercial drives me crazy, too. (Fortunately, I watch very little TV and what I do watch I get via Hulu or Netflix, so my exposure to commercials in general is blessedly minimal.)

I'll even go Mr. Goldberg one better and admit that I personally dislike diamonds. Of all gemstones, I find them the most boring and ugly. They are about as interesting to look at as a flashlight, in my opinion- just a chunk of overpriced, blinding hyperwhiteness.

And my first words when my sweeheart presented me with a (sapphire-studded) engagement ring were: "Is this paid for? How could you afford this? It looks too expensive!"

I was on the verge of launching into a lecture about the foolishness of throwing away money on jewelry for me when he was still struggling when I realized he was, like, proposing marriage. Erm...

It’s time to start calling the current situation what it is: a depression. True, it’s not a full replay of the Great Depression, but that’s cold comfort. Unemployment in both America and Europe remains disastrously high. Leaders and institutions are increasingly discredited. And democratic values are under siege.

...............

Let’s talk, in particular, about what’s happening in Europe — not because all is well with America, but because the gravity of European political developments isn’t widely understood.

First of all, the crisis of the euro is killing the European dream. The shared currency, which was supposed to bind nations together, has instead created an atmosphere of bitter acrimony.

Specifically, demands for ever-harsher austerity, with no offsetting effort to foster growth, have done double damage. They have failed as economic policy, worsening unemployment without restoring confidence; a Europe-wide recession now looks likely even if the immediate threat of financial crisis is contained. And they have created immense anger, with many Europeans furious at what is perceived, fairly or unfairly (or actually a bit of both), as a heavy-handed exercise of German power.

Nobody familiar with Europe’s history can look at this resurgence of hostility without feeling a shiver.

...............

This piece appeared in the New York Times on December 11, 2011. Below are my comments posted on October 5, 2011:

Plenty of individuals in this country never held excessive credit card debt, used their houses as ATM machines or fudged application facts in order to buy more house than they could afford. Yet they were inevitably dragged down and worked over by mistakes they never made. Like everyone else, they lost jobs. Their carefully hoarded savings earn no interest. If they managed to keep their job, they have little job security and likely haven't had a raise in 2 or 3 years. They acted carefully and prudently while others frolicked with cheap money, but once the massive bailouts and failures began, it made no difference.

If you are one of those prudent people, you know how angry you feel. Now imagine an entire nation becoming that angry.

And now, be afraid. Be very, very afraid.

Since the European debt crisis began, I've noticed a worrisome return to the psuedo-ethnic stereotypes that were once common in WWII-era thought: The warm climate makes Mediterranean people lazy and self-indulgent. The Germans are cold, overbearing control freaks. The jews control all the money.

We have seen this movie before.

I will never be a Nobel Laureate like Mr. Krugman and I will never claim to be an economist.

But sometimes the view from the ground is sharper and quicker than from the ivory tower.

Today is the 3rd anniversary of the Woodburn Bombing. On this day in 2008, a homemade bomb exploded in a local bank in the little town of Woodburn, Oregon. The blast killed Captain Tom Tennant of the Woodburn Police and Senior Trooper William Hakim of the Oregon State Police. It nearly killed Woodburn Police Chief Scott Russell, who survived thanks to expert EMT treatment at the scene and numerous surgeries thereafter.

The bombing was a vicious, violent crime that tore two men from their families and permanently maimed a third, but that is not why I mark the anniversary. I mark it because of what followed the bombing. Within hours the citizens of Woodburn began banding together, flooding the community with volunteers to help the families of the fallen and search for ways to support and improve the entire town.

Perhaps the first hint came during the memorial procession arranged for Captain Tom Tennant on December 19th. An unusually early winter storm had left roads covered in snow and ice, but as the solemn parade of ambulances, fire trucks and police cars made its way through town, the citizens of Woodburn lined the sidewalks. They waved big American flags and displayed handmade signs that said: Thank You, Captain Tom. Volunteers had tied blue ribbons around trees and signposts to honor the police.

Not long after the bombing, Woodburn City Administrator Scott Derickson met with the city council. Put your pet projects aside, he told them. It's time to heal the city.

Captain Tennant and Trooper Hakim both left behind families with teenage children, and after multiple surgeries and months in intensive care, Police Chief Russell's medical bills were escalating. Woodburn residents began collecting donations, and to streamline the process Mayor Kathy Figley created Woodburn Proud, a 501(c)(3) charity.

It wasn't long before Woodburn Proud broadened its agenda. They organized cleanup crews for various sites around the city. They staged 5k Fun Runs and Woodburn Appreciation Nights. They began selling a line of Woodburn Proud merchandise- tee-shirts, wristbands and car magnets- to raise money and promote community pride. They participated in campaigns to combat street crime.

The Woodburn Proud organization is still going strong and has even begun reaching out to surrounding communities. Working together, the citizens of Woodburn drowned the ugly crime of 12/12/08 in a wave of positive, can-do energy that continues today.

That's why I mark the day. In these tough times, with so many of us fearful and struggling, Woodburn is an inspiration.

This is quite a change from the late 1960s-early 1970s when the message of the sitcom was to have 3 kids, kill your spouse, then marry someone else with 3 kids who had killed their spouse. Ever notice they never explain what happened to the first Mrs. Brady and the first Mr. Carol? The kids never mention the missing parents, either. Their unspoken terror was palpable.

And also this quote, given in response:

I always wondered why all six kids had to share one bathroom... you think there was another bathroom they couldn't use any more because that's where the bodies were walled up?

This Reuters interviews features the comments of Pearl Harbor survivor Don Stratton:

Don Stratton is correct when he says that people forget. I wonder what will be remembered about 9/11 70 years from now?

There was an apochryphal story in my ex-husband's family. His grandparents had friends living in Hawaii in December 1941. They were American citizens of Japanese extraction. December 7th was a Sunday. The wife had gone into town on an errand while her husband relaxed in his kimono in their livingroom, reading. Suddenly, the front door burst open. His wife charged into the room.

"Stand up!" she ordered. Bewildered, he got out of his chair. Before he could stop her, she ripped the kimono off his back, ran outside and stuffed it into the trash incinerator. When she came back she yanked a brand-new, American-style bathrobe out of a shopping bag and threw it at him.

"Put this on," she snapped. "We're in trouble."

We remember stories like this now, and stories of the Japanese internment. But at the time of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese military was remembered for their barbarous behavior during the Rape of Nanking in 1937:

On December 9, the Japanese troops launched a massive attack upon the city. On the 12th, the defending Chinese troops decided to retreat to the other side of the Yangtze River (Yangzi Jiang). On December 13, the 6th and 16th Divisions of the Japanese Army entered the city' s Zhongshan and Pacific Gates. In the afternoon, two Japanese Navy fleets arrived. In the following six weeks, the occupying forces engaged in an orgy of looting and mass execution which came to be known as the Nanking Massacre. Most experts agree that at least 300,000 Chinese died, and 20,000 women were raped. Some estimate the numbers to be much higher - 340,000 and 80,000 respectively.

Things are forgotten because narratives compete over time. It does not seem appropriate to dwell on the documented atrocities of Nanking while the peaceful Japanese nation of today struggles with the Fukushima disaster. Likewise, guilt over the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined with the memory of our own civil rights struggles in the 1960s have brought Japanese Internment to the forefront of American memory in recent times.

Both of these narratives contain important truths, yet neither tells the entire story. The piece that we re-examine and honor today is the sudden attack on O'ahu and the brave Americans who gave their lives resisting it: 2,043 dead (68 civilians), 1,178 injured.

Some interesting links:

History.com- a thorough treatment of the subject, with articles and video.

CNIC.navy.mil- The official Pearl Harbor Joint Base website, with complete, up-to-date reports on the observances taking place there today.

British Pathe.com- an outstanding collection of histoic videos covering all aspects of the attack, including the Japanese reaction and event in Hawaii.

"Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and nobody around them who works," Gingrich replied. "So they literally have no habit of showing up on Monday. They have no habit of staying all day. They have no habit of 'I do this and you give me cash,' unless it's illegal."

He said he favored putting children to work in paid jobs at the schools they attend "as early as is reasonable and practical."

Gingrich initially drew criticism for the idea after an appearance at Harvard last month, when he promised "extraordinarily radical proposals" to change America's "culture of poverty," such as allowing children as young as 9 to replace adult janitors at schools.

Since we already know that Mr. Gingrich can't stay faithful to a wife I had been wondering what he, as the latest Republican fad, would do to self-destruct.

I congratulate him on his creativity. This really is a first-class FAIL. There is so much stupid to unpack here that it's difficult to know where to start. A few brief points:

Replacing adult workers in schools with children means throwing more parents out of work. How does this give children the example of working adults?

Replacing adult workers with children is the starting line of a 'race to the bottom.' The introduction of cheap child labor would have the same impact within the U.S. as it currently does outside the U.S.- job destruction and a rapidly disappearing middle class. On the other hand, why should we compete with child labor in places like China and the Phillipines when we can just institute it at home? Our kids can outwork their kids any day!

Will someone please bitch-slap this man for winning first prize in the Bad Optics contest? Think about it: A rich white guy in a country with a history of slavery, running against the first black president, is advocating child labor. He's going to face Obama in a debate and tout the benefits of child labor? And Republicans think that will sell? Seriously?

A new meme has quickly emerged in response to Mr. Gingrinch's remarks: Japanese children clean their schools, so child janitors can't be such a bad idea. The practice this meme is referencing is known as "o-soji." It is also a red herring and a dodge in this context.

O-soji is a specific "cleaning period" that is part of every Japanese child's school day, just like recess or math class. It can be as short as 15 minutes. All students and teachers participate, performing cleanup activities as a group. This is a far cry from what Mr. Gingrich is proposing. First, no one is paid for the cleaning. Second, cleaning activities only take up a small part of the total school day and do not constitute even a part-time job. Third, everyone in the building- teachers and all students- participates equally. No one is singled out as a low-wage "worker" being taught a "work ethic." O-soji is simply viewed as part of learning community values of teamwork and good stewardship. Students in all schools, rich and poor, participate.

(There's some cynical pushback against the idea of o-soji and the overblown reputation of Japanese schools here.)

There have been many comments that "liberals" are getting "hysterical" about Newt's comments and taking them out of context. I disagree. Mr. Gingrich may claim that he is outlining a very narrow and specific program, but the end result of his idea would be the normalizing of child labor. Once the shock of seeing 9-year-old children working in schools has worn off, it is likely that other employers would begin to lobby for expanding the child workforce. After all, many U.S. companies seem quite comfortable with- if not outright envious of- the labor policies in 3rd world countries. Of course, their demands would all be framed as being "in the best interests of the child." You know- teaching values, keeping kids off the mean streets, that sort of thing.

Mr. Gingrich's ideas also betray a complete ignorance of the lives of the working poor. My husband has spent the better part of his teaching career working with "at risk" children in some pretty scary neighborhoods. Yes, there are some multi-generation welfare families, but there are also plenty of parents living "on the other side of the tracks" who work two and three minimum-wage jobs to get by and want their kids to concentrate on school so they can get ahead in life. And he has seen plenty of those kids go on to earn MBAs or qualify for medical school. The idea that they have no positive influences and no work ethic is something peddled by television drama, not reality.

And finally, I should point out that I am writing as the granddaughter of a man who was forced to drop out of school at 14 to help support his family. My grandfather was a very bright and hardworking man who began his working life in a coal mine and eventually became a self-taught mechanic. He managed to carve out a working-class life for his family, but his opportunities remained limited. I have always wondered what he might have become if he had been able to apply his intelligence and initiative to further schooling.

He never voiced any bitterness over his lot, but the day I was born he opened a bank account dedicated to funding my college education. Sometimes actions speak louder than words.

Check out this video shot by fishermen off the coast of Wrightsville Beach, N.C. yesterday:

Matt Garrett of Boston and some friends were fishing in a flat, calm sea about 25 miles from Wrightsville Beach. Garrett says the fish stopped biting and they saw the fins of the huge ocean predator.

............

Paul Barrington of the North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher confirmed that the video shows a great white shark, which is rare for the North Carolina coast.

Fishermen! It's what's for dinner...

Seriously- experts are saying that the group on the boat did exactly the right thing in remaining quiet and leaving the shark alone while it circled them. It has been suggested that the shark was simply curious, not trying to feed.

(Maybe they should have taken the opportunity to chuck the last of that Thanksgiving turkey overboard and get rid of it. Just kidding.)